The present invention relates to improvements in apparatus for transporting successive containers for exposed photographic roll films. More particularly, the invention relates to improvements in apparatus for transporting containers for photographic roll films of the type wherein the films are convoluted on the cores of cylindrical reels having pairs of flanges which flank the convoluted films and are confined in cylindrical shells whose end portions carry end walls and which are provided with axially parallel mouths through which the films can be moved while the containers are confined in the housings of photographic apparatus. Still more particularly, the invention relates to apparatus for transporting cartridges or analogous containers for exposed photographic roll films to an opening station where the rolls of exposed photographic film and the respective reels are expelled from their shells preparatory to unwinding of the films from the respective cores.
German Pat. No. 23 35 453 discloses an apparatus wherein the mouth of the shell of a cartridge containing exposed photographic film is slipped onto a gripper consisting of resilient sheet metal and the gripper is thereupon pivoted into the interior of the apparatus wherein the reel is withdrawn from the respective cartridge. Such mounting of the cartridge prior to introduction into the apparatus ensures that the mouth is invariably held in a predetermined orientation with respect to the reel-removing instrumentalities. However, such apparatus also exhibit a number of serious drawbacks. First of all, the apparatus can process a relatively small number of cartridges per unit of time. Secondly, a cartridge can be inserted onto the gripper in improper orientation (at an angle of 180.degree. with respect to the proper orientation), and the film is likely to be damaged if the reel-expelling operation is not carried out in a prescribed way.